On Radio 4 there was an item on the wave of knife crime affecting London and other English cities, and the discussion turned to the holistic approach towards the problem, treating it basically in terms of it being a sort of problem of public health, taken by Glasgow, which has had some success with this approach.

An expert talking head was asked whether this could work, and her reply was that it must work. However, it depended on multi-agency co-ordination. For example, across the housing, prisons, education, social work, policing and local government sectors. There needs to be housing for offenders leaving prison. There needs to be rehabilitation programmes in prisons. There needs to be a re-building of community cohesion. There needs to be youth workers guiding our kids.

Pondering the notion that what is needed is for all of these things to be - well, just adequate, really, just properly functioning, I found my self thinking that basically, we have the problems that we do with knife crime because everything is shit. The resources we need for all of those things have left them falling short of what is needed at every single level.

At the most basic level, that's the explanation. And why is everything shit? Because for 10 years, government, Tory/Lib Dem and then Brexity Tory, has made it so. Austerity, then wasting billions on acting out some idiotic Tory anti-European ideological fantasy instead of addressing the real needs of people. A self-destructive charge towards everything being deliberately made even more shit than it is already. And as a bonus, an upsurge in racism, xenophobia, and far right terrorism (MPs facing routine death threats and even an actual MP being actually murdered).

I hate it. I hate everything being so shit. And I hate that it was deliberately made so utterly shit because that's what Tories do, but that this bunch had done it with fucking knobs on.

I hate it so much, I've become gibberingly incoherent.

I was reflecting earlier how fortunate I was to grow up in the New Labour administration. Though towards the end there was a gloomy melange that I'll spare you all the tedious detailing of, up to 2007 and maybe even into 2008 all seemed rosy and even if you screwed up academically like I had, it would just be a temporary setback and everything would be all right in the end.

Nine years would pretty much cover the entirety of when school becomes important for me, and I see it as those being academically inclined to be in trash compactor like pressure because if you're going to go university it had better be a good one, landing a city finance job with a 2:2 from University of Leicester might have been possible in 2003 but you really need to stand out now to get onto a graduate scheme. I'm not even going to start on the altruistic souls who join the public sector to give something back to society, all virtue of that has been crushed under the malice or incompetent of apalling ministers.

And for the forlorn on the other end of the horse shoe, well it's even more hopless. Finally getting to leave school 4 years after you would have wanted into a chain of zero hours contracts where the only social interaction you get is confrontation from a burnt out public whose tipping point could legitmately be something from Falling Down. Maybe one of those confrontations ends in a hospital trip where there's a 3 hour wait for some stitches because all of the doctors are overworked and underpaid. And maybe whilst you're at the hospital your shitty flat gets broken into and the only valuable electronics you have get nicked and the whole thing has cost you a month's wages in less than 6 hours with no closure because the police don't have the resources to work it other than taking your details and hoping there's enough pattern to create a dedicated task force.

I could never quite understand Monkey Dust portraying the death of civil society in 2003, if anything it's more like that hellscape now. My mate has a niece he's a quasi-Guardian of, she's always been a sunny, sweet little child happiest when creatively playing. It genuinely depresses me to think eventually she has to choose what she does to justify her existence and the decades of drudgery extinguishing any spark inside. Cameron and Osborne have slipped from my rifle sights since 2016 but my hatred for them has renewed vigour. Their callous asset stripping will be felt for decades and they won't even spare it a thought other than "Stalin McBroon made us do it!".

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I think we collectively lack the tools to have the discussion we need.

We've had 40 years of it becoming accepted dogma that big government is bad. That the state she be shrunk evermore, and that's OK, because you, the individual can keep more of your hard earned cash, because its no-longer going to be spent teaching Ugandan lesbians to knit quilts.

If there's one hope from this Brexit mess its that young people may actually awaken and realise that if they dont speak up then it will only get worse.

I remember being out canvassing at one point in the Thatcher years and meeting a man on the doorstep who gave me both barrels on taxation. Why, he asked, should he continue to pay taxes for education after his kids had left school? He had no concept of social responsibility, he was one of those 'liberated' by Thatcher's statement that there was no such thing as society.

At the time he was an outlier. By now his views are approaching majority (and held by numbers of senior Tories). That means that as a society we are fucked, of course.

I think we collectively lack the tools to have the discussion we need.

We've had 40 years of it becoming accepted dogma that big government is bad. That the state she be shrunk evermore, and that's OK, because you, the individual can keep more of your hard earned cash, because its no-longer going to be spent teaching Ugandan lesbians to knit quilts.

If there's one hope from this Brexit mess its that young people may actually awaken and realise that if they dont speak up then it will only get worse.

I think that's correct - we do collectively lack the tools . My rant descended into incoherence partly because I was tired and angry, but also because of this tool paucity.

What I was trying to stress, was, I suppose, the extent to which everything is connected, and the example of the things that are needed for the "public health" approach to addressing knife violence to begin successfully to address and resolve the problem.

And the extent to which the Tories over 10 years have cumulatively and deliberately undermined and stripped of resources virtually every public service that that approach to knife violence requires. To the point that addressing the dreadfully serious problem of knife crime has become quite incredibly difficult to achieve where it might otherwise be possible to mobilise the required resources more or less immediately.

The problem is, and always has been, the Tories, and Tory ideology. The bogus cuts programme in the name of "austerity" and its abject failure. The waste of time and colossally of resources that Brexit represents - the extent to which Brexit has absorbed all of the political oxygen at the expense of doing literally anything else that this country so desperately needs.

At this point, you might expect someone like Swinegums to pop up and suggest that what is required is a Corbyn-led government red in tooth and claw. But I'm by no means certain of that - simply because of Corbyn's failure to recognise that Brexit, if delivered - with his help because that is now probably the only way it can now be delivered - would not only seriously inhibit any Corbyn/Labour government's capability successfully to address the country's enormous list of problems, but would seriously endanger the prospect of such a government being elected in the first place.

Things are so bad that I would, despite its obvious flaws, joyfully welcome a Corbyn Labour government. But I'd be considerably happier with a Labour government that had the capability to deliver a radical programme of reform while being capable of ensuring the second and third terms of progressive Labour government that are truly needed to get the UK back on the right track.

Things are so bad that I would, despite its obvious flaws, joyfully welcome a Corbyn Labour government. But I'd be considerably happier with a Labour government that had the capability to deliver a radical programme of reform while being capable of ensuring the second and third terms of progressive Labour government that are truly needed to get the UK back on the right track.

A full on Corbyn style government wouldn't be good for the country either, as it is born of ideology and not an evidence based and pragmatic way of creating policy. Both the further left and further right never see the policy at fault, but the people instead.
I have no idea who can provide this kind of thoughtful leadership; it is totally lacking at the moment. The CUKs (as our friend likes to call them) seem to have gone all but silent too.

The whole 'who needs experts' thing is getting worse. The current view seems to be what feels right is right, when it blatantly obvious with a moments critical thinking that view is rubbish.

The nadir of this is the growing Flat Earth moment. The main argument seems to be, 'You can't feel the earth moving and at ground level the earth looks flat, so it must be' any evidence to the opposite is ignored and abuse is hurled at those who try to show the Flat Earthers the error of their ways, this abuse is normally with a combination of homophobic and anti-semitic slurs with appalling grammar throw in for good measure.

I remember being out canvassing at one point in the Thatcher years and meeting a man on the doorstep who gave me both barrels on taxation. Why, he asked, should he continue to pay taxes for education after his kids had left school? He had no concept of social responsibility, he was one of those 'liberated' by Thatcher's statement that there was no such thing as society.

At the time he was an outlier. By now his views are approaching majority (and held by numbers of senior Tories). That means that as a society we are fucked, of course.

See also anti-vaxxers, Freemen of the Land and other fuckwits.

Everytime I see one of those "TAXATION IS THEFT!" twats on the internet I wish to hit them with a sack of doorknobs.

Monetarism has made many people adopt corner shop economics, if they the consumer aren't personally benefitting from it then they should not pay it and be commended for their thriftiness. I am unsure how we persuade public perception of taxation back towards a more positive light beyond poking holes at laughable libertarian posturing on the internet.

I remember being out canvassing at one point in the Thatcher years and meeting a man on the doorstep who gave me both barrels on taxation. Why, he asked, should he continue to pay taxes for education after his kids had left school? He had no concept of social responsibility, he was one of those 'liberated' by Thatcher's statement that there was no such thing as society.

At the time he was an outlier. By now his views are approaching majority (and held by numbers of senior Tories). That means that as a society we are fucked, of course.

See also anti-vaxxers, Freemen of the Land and other fuckwits.

Everytime I see one of those "TAXATION IS THEFT!" twats on the internet I wish to hit them with a sack of doorknobs.

Monetarism has made many people adopt corner shop economics, if they the consumer aren't personally benefitting from it then they should not pay it and be commended for their thriftiness. I am unsure how we persuade public perception of taxation back towards a more positive light beyond poking holes at laughable libertarian posturing on the internet.

"Why should I have to pay tax to fund a statist military force when I can use my own marksmanship skills to defend myself, my family & my property?"

I remember being out canvassing at one point in the Thatcher years and meeting a man on the doorstep who gave me both barrels on taxation. Why, he asked, should he continue to pay taxes for education after his kids had left school? He had no concept of social responsibility, he was one of those 'liberated' by Thatcher's statement that there was no such thing as society.

At the time he was an outlier. By now his views are approaching majority (and held by numbers of senior Tories). That means that as a society we are fucked, of course.

See also anti-vaxxers, Freemen of the Land and other fuckwits.

Everytime I see one of those "TAXATION IS THEFT!" twats on the internet I wish to hit them with a sack of doorknobs.

Monetarism has made many people adopt corner shop economics, if they the consumer aren't personally benefitting from it then they should not pay it and be commended for their thriftiness. I am unsure how we persuade public perception of taxation back towards a more positive light beyond poking holes at laughable libertarian posturing on the internet.

Oh Christ, those fuckers I used to encounter one on a car forum I used to frequent - I shouldn't be taxed, you should only pay for what you choose to use. So, I don't use libraries, schools, the fire/police services... why should I pay for them?

I remember being out canvassing at one point in the Thatcher years and meeting a man on the doorstep who gave me both barrels on taxation. Why, he asked, should he continue to pay taxes for education after his kids had left school? He had no concept of social responsibility, he was one of those 'liberated' by Thatcher's statement that there was no such thing as society.

At the time he was an outlier. By now his views are approaching majority (and held by numbers of senior Tories). That means that as a society we are fucked, of course.

See also anti-vaxxers, Freemen of the Land and other fuckwits.

Everytime I see one of those "TAXATION IS THEFT!" twats on the internet I wish to hit them with a sack of doorknobs.

Monetarism has made many people adopt corner shop economics, if they the consumer aren't personally benefitting from it then they should not pay it and be commended for their thriftiness. I am unsure how we persuade public perception of taxation back towards a more positive light beyond poking holes at laughable libertarian posturing on the internet.

Oh Christ, those fuckers I used to encounter one on a car forum I used to frequent - I shouldn't be taxed, you should only pay for what you choose to use. So, I don't use libraries, schools, the fire/police services... why should I pay for them?

Fucking cocksockets.

Remember the earliest fire services when they'd only put out your flaming property if you had bought the right paperwork from them?

Great times.

I'm also intrigued how libertarians can explain that a private police force would be in any way more accountable than a centralized one.

Or how a private (think home schooling in this sense) education would be any less biased than a national curriculum.

You made him a poacher yourself, Squire
When you'd give not the work nor the meat
And your barley-fed hares robbed the garden
At our starving poor little one's feet